The Verge reviewed Android 4.1, Jelly Bean. "Android 4.1 Jelly Bean is one of the best products Google has ever produced. It's fast, fluid, and beautifully designed. It also does a better job of unifying all of Google's disparate services than anything else the company has ever offered. Everything from the Chrome browser, Google+, Maps, Gmail, and most of all Google Search - in the form of Google Now - is tightly integrated into a user experience that outshines even the company's web properties."

have been using a totally stock Android 4.0 which I think most people don't (or can't) use so maybe that is where this misconception that iOS is nicer comes from. Or maybe it is just a historical thing since prior to ICS, Android wasn't as good and most people are still not using Android.

Android devices are like Windows PCs - quality varies greatly from device-to-device, and the user experience will reflect this. If you go out and buy the Android equivalent of a bottom-of-the-barrel PC at Wal-mart for $200-$300 that is cheaply made, under-powered, and/or loaded down with crapware before you even take it out of the box, then of course you're going to have a miserable experience with it.

People will say that choice is good, and I tend to agree with this, but there needs to be some sort of quality control, like a 'seal of approval' or something. At least give the consumer some sort of assurance that 'this device isn't going to completely suck ass', and you can guarantee that this seal would not be on any of those $100 tablets you can find on sale at the corner drug store.

You are talking about a much broader question than I am. I'm just saying the software is better. Of course there are crappy target devices and the OEM's screw with the OS and ruin the experience.

In any case, I disagree that cheap devices can't have a good experience. Even cheap $100 phones and tablets could have AOSP via roms or if the OEMs simply weren't such total imbeciles in thinking that they are improving their product by "differentiating".

If an OEM wants to differentiate, they should just commit to using 100% AOSP and releasing fast updates.

I didn't say cheap Android devices can't be good. I'm saying that most of them are complete garbage, and there isn't (AFAIK) a $100 Android tablet currently on the market that's worth a damn. Even the Kindle Fire is just sub-par.

People will say that choice is good, and I tend to agree with this, but there needs to be some sort of quality control, like a 'seal of approval' or something. At least give the consumer some sort of assurance that 'this device isn't going to completely suck ass'....

I'm with you. Some of the device offerings, even those from the major brands, have been abysmal. It's one thing to have a custom skin and carrier bloatware, but it's another to use one that can barely run the apps it comes with.

More importantly, this lack of quality control on Google's part gets worse in their own app marketplace. Seriously, a Rick Santorum app? Might as well get the heroin and meth pushers to release something, to complement all the other apps made by criminals.